


a long way down to nowhere

by Dahlia_Moon



Category: Chicago Fire
Genre: Coda, Episode Tag, Episode: s01e02 Mon Amour, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-28
Updated: 2013-02-28
Packaged: 2017-12-03 22:36:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,092
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/703387
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dahlia_Moon/pseuds/Dahlia_Moon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Casey will always be there for him, even if Severide never actually says the words.</p>
            </blockquote>





	a long way down to nowhere

**Author's Note:**

> You know how, sometimes, you have that one fic where you write a substantial amount and then writer's block hits and you abandon said fic? But then, months later, you come back to it and finish it? Yeah, that was this fic, glaringly obvious when I started writing it.
> 
> Also, I had wanted this to be a get-together fic, but it didn't want to cooperate, so while I'd classify this as a gen piece, it could've gone either way really (that is, I definitely wrote Kelly as having feelings, deeply buried feelings, for Casey).

It's late by the time he gets home from visiting Peter's wife. Kelly calls out for Leslie, but she doesn't seem to be home. He hopes she's with her Alabama girl. They need all the happiness they can get; there's not enough to go around in the world.

He stumbles into the chair at the kitchen counter, the tiredness seeping into his bones and barely holding him upright. He rubs his exhausted face, and drops his head in his hands, just being still and listening to the quiet around him. Life's been beating him down lately, making him question why he's the one left standing alive and well at the end of the day. It doesn't seem fair that Peter, Peter who had the loving wife, had to die when he's still alive and a coward and a fuck-up in so many ways. Why Darden was the one caught in the flames that day when it was Kelly's fucking job to vent the house. Why it was Darden, who had left behind a wife and two kids, who had to die when Kelly is the one who doesn't have anyone, the one who doesn't have as much to leave behind.

It seems like he's losing everyone around him. People he's been close to his whole life, and people he's only known for a day but wishes he could've known for just as much. Life is throwing him shit.

He is moping there on his kitchen chair, with a bottle of beer in his hand, the quiet sneaking up on him and making him depressed. And then his phone beeps. It's a text message. From Casey.

_Missed you at the bar. Hope everything's ok._

His thumb pauses over the reply button. Everything's not okay. He doesn't even know where to begin though.

 _Had to go do something. Sorry I missed everyone._ He hits send, looking at the phone like it's his only lifeline at the moment (maybe it is).

_Are you alright?_

Casey will know something's wrong with him if he keeps skirting around the question. But he can't bring himself to type the words he needs to type to placate Casey. He _doesn't_ want to placate Casey. Kelly wants to tell him how the world sucks so very fucking much (a fact Casey probably knows too well), how he's so depressed it's a major battle to get up most mornings and deal with people (deal with Heather, who hates him now and looks at him with disgust and a coldness when previously there was only warmth and friendship). He suddenly gets the epiphany that this is the same kind of cold harshness Casey has had to endure from him for the month following Darden's death. Karma, as Otis is fond of saying.

The truth is that he needs someone now; he needs _Casey_ , if he's being honest with himself. But it's difficult to write the words, to let his guard down, to appear needy and emotional, to keep his emotions under the surface, to smile, joke, and pretend everything is fine when everything is so far from fine, it's in an entirely different galaxy.

He types _yeah_ furiously, and slams the phone onto the table. And then picks it up again, and re-reads his reply. He winces at his short message, imagining the neediness and abruptness that must be coming through in neon colors.

He waits nervously for Casey's reply, not really sure if he's waiting for the other man to say goodbye or continue their conversation. He'd like to admit to wanting neither, but he'd definitely prefer the latter, except it's not so much Casey's words coming to him through the electronic device that he wants so much as he wants _Casey_ himself to be _here_ , a close comfort.

_I'm coming over with beer._

_Sure._ He breathes a loud sigh of relief.

Casey is still here. He hasn't lost him.

~*~

A little later, Casey shows up at his door with a six-pack. Kelly thinks there’s always a good time for beer, even nearing the middle of the night. Casey joins him at the counter, handing him a bottle.

“You had a tough day?” Casey asks, rubbing the neck of his bottle absently.

“Actually, more like tough several months.”

They’re silent, and it’s more comforting than Kelly would’ve thought. He just needs Casey to be next to him, to know that Casey will be there for him even if Kelly can't put it into words, even if there are so many things Kelly can’t admit, either to himself or to Casey.

“No matter what anyone says, it’s not your fault Andy died. Fires are always unpredictable. You can do everything correctly and still, shit like this will happen.”

“It’s not just Andy’s death, well – it’s a major part of it, but I don’t know, it just seems like I shouldn’t be losing people. You know that construction worker, Peter? He took his last breaths to leave a video message behind for his wife. And in those fifteen minutes that I spent down there with him, it felt like I knew his whole life story. I had to go deliver his message to his wife. For the second time, I had to hear his last loving message to his wife, this person he loved so much but felt like he didn’t deserve. He called me the son he had always wanted. And I keep thinking: why the fuck am I the one who gets out alive when people I care about die? People who leave behind others who love them and who aren’t ever gonna be okay again.”

“Whoa…you have people who care and love you. It might not be a significant other, but you do have family and friends who’d be just as distraught if you had died. Andy, for one, wouldn’t ever be okay again if you had died. And…neither would I, for that matter.”

He tries to be humbled by that. 

Casey continues, “You’re needed on the team. You’re the only one who fucking goes down into an unstable hole. You inspire us to laugh in the face of danger.”

“You done?”

“I know it’s cheesy, but it’s true.”

“You just like saying ridiculously cheesy lines.”

“I do, and would you have me any other way?”

No, no, Kelly wouldn’t. But that’s a whole ‘nother conversation Kelly is sure he'd never be able to have. 

Kelly just shakes his head, and laughs at Casey.

He hasn't mucked this up. He hasn't lost Casey. And, for that, he's grateful.


End file.
